


The First Time

by hypersonicJD



Category: Milo Murphy's Law
Genre: Bombs, Cave, Death, Gen, Impaled, Sacrifice, Self-Sacrifice, laboratory, villain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:55:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28156422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hypersonicJD/pseuds/hypersonicJD
Summary: Cavendish and Dakota take on a mission that could very well change their lives for the first time, but how is it gonna turn out?
Relationships: Balthazar Cavendish & Vinnie Dakota
Kudos: 10
Collections: Team Cavota





	The First Time

**Author's Note:**

> This work is a slight continuation from my fanfic The Blossom of a Harmful Flower, you do not NEED to read it to understand this fic at all, but for knowing a small piece of context mentioned here you should give it a read, you can probably find it by clicking my name and looking at previous works.
> 
> Edit: 2 new images have been added to this fanfic! They will probably be the only ones however, so I do hope you guys like them on any reread you might have :) The artist who made these is Charmmy, and I would absolutely love all of you if you could check out her twitter! She definitely deserves the praise :P https://twitter.com/CharmmyColour

It was a very bright and warm day, it was 1:00 PM for Cavendish and Dakota, they were walking down in the forest, trying to look for a specific place, as that day they had to complete a very important mission that could change the turn of history for humanity as a whole, failure would mean the whole civilization crumpling.

The year was 2025 with Cavendish sporting his getup from 2175, blond handlebar mustache and his glasses. Dakota was still using his black jacket, cargo pants and boots, as they keep walking forward, wanting to spark a little bit of chatter, Dakota tries to bright us the mood as it is too serious for his liking.

“You know? If this wasn’t a mission this would be a pretty good stroll through a forest, looking at the birds, the animals, even the trees themselves, don’tcha think?” Dakota gazes upon his partner who is looking at his tracking device, very focused and determined on his duty.

“Cavendish?”

Cavendish turns his head to Dakota and does not seem pleased to be interrupted on the search for the place they are supposed to be at.

“ _What_ ”

Dakota frowns at Balthazar’s notion and proceeds to complain.

“Geez… You don’t have to give me that look, I’m just tryin to make the journey not be as… You know, dull and boring. I know we are trying to save the world here but we really should calm ourselves down, otherwise we are gonna get overwhelmed by our emotions and fail”

Analyzing what his co-worker has explained Cavendish decides to stop glaring at Dakota with that annoyed frown and take his piece on the conversation, explaining grimly on the situation.

“Dakota, this is an extremely serious matter! Most of the time I would agree with you and not feel so anxious about this sort of thing, but this mission is about stopping a possible outbreak for a harmful substance! This could put in danger many, many people if we are unable to stop it. Every other time travel agent is busy at the moment with their own missions, and we aren’t allowed to either mess up, or use time travel to fix it IF we do mess it up. It is quite a major turning point for us and the world!”

The British man tries to make it as clear as possible to his partner that they cannot mess this up, after many failed missions, this is one of their most important ones, and not many agents know about the existence of it at all. It is that important and confidential, and they have gotten lucky enough to be able to even attempt to complete it.

Dakota’s face shows concern and is at a better grasp of the situation, but even so he still wants it to be an adventure, not a mission.

“Well… I getcha… I still want it to feel like an adventure though, a journey! That way it doesn’t feel as… Dire and important, I know I gotta take it seriously and I will do my best to stop this from happening, but you also need to relax! Being so tense is not good for your mentality, at all”

Vinnie’s expression changes from his usually relaxed and understanding look into more of a regretful and nervous attitude, as he wants to say something that he had boxed in his mind for a while.

“In fact… We ended up failing some of our missions because you took them way too seriously, tensed up and something went wrong when we were about to finish”

Cavendish’s glare returned, and now it was even worse than before, feeling attacked and oppressed.

“Oh… So you are saying it was my fault!? What about that mission when we had to take care of a very important piece of time travel history and you ended up covering it all with that stupid cheese hotdog idea you had!?”

Dakota in order to defend himself from the accussation, rebuttals with his own response.

“Hey! I didn’t know the hotdog was gonna fall off like that from the bun! I thought the bun was gonna be able to handle the hotdog and the cheese at the same time!”

Before they bicker anymore, the brit makes a stopping motion with his hand.

“Enough”

Both of them stop inmediately and stare at each other silently, until Cavendish opens his mouth to speak one more time.

“We should not fight at this nick of time Dakota, we are partners and we are supposed to work together, let us hurry and try to stop this catastrophe from happening, all right? Afterwards maybe we can have some food and rest, who knows”

Dakota receives the message, not wanting to say anything more he gives him a thumbs up alongside a nod from his head. Cavendish in response does the same nod as Dakot and they continue onwards.

Finally, after 3 hours of pure walking prowess, they have made it.

It is a very, very big cave entrance that from the inside looks like any normal cave but most likely is a secret lair for the villanous being that is orquestrating the catastrophe that the time travel agents are trying to stop.

The pair step into the darkest with flashlights, making sure they are sticking together to not get lost in the depths of the rocky structure.

To their dismay, a sudden turn from their flashlights to check on where to go lets them see a human skeleton with bits of skin still on it, only barely however.

“C-c-cavendish… Is that what I think it is?” Dakota stutters in fear as to what they have just found, and his partner gulps in preparation to answer.

“Yes Dakota, that is indeed a dead body”

The time travel agents look at each other, with deep concern, fear and doubt.

Should they actually handle this mission themselves? Should they wait for another time travel agent to get free from their duty and help them out? Or should they “man up” and enter to the unknown?

Balthazar chooses to take the latter and give his co-worker words of encouragement.

“Do not worry Dakota, that will not happen to us, we are very capable time agents, don’t you see? We can handle anything that can be thrown in our way, nobody and nothing will stop us!”

Cavendish says with a confident smirk, wanting to make their spirits high, fortunately for the middle aged man, it has worked.

“Y-yeah! We are way better than that guy or whoever that was, we CAN handle this, we are Dakota and Cavendish! The invincible duo!”

It appears as their own cheers have alerted their enemy however. They see some troop looking group come towards them with military caliber weapons.

“Freeze!”

One of the soldiers yells at the pair, and both of them look in shock, not expecting to see such a well armed group.

Cavendish and Dakota decide to whisper as a way to figure out what to do now.

“Cavendish, what are we gonna do now?”

“I… I have something, but I want you to cover your ears, I already have something prepared for my own ears. Okay?”

“Okay”

The soldier gets even more agitated and frustrated, as the pair do not shut their mouths off and aren’t cooperating.

“Hey! Zip it you two! Put your hands in the air and get on the ground!”

Cavendish pretends to answer very submissively and defeated as he also starts to put his hands up.

“Y-y-yes! W-we give up…” As he is doing the motion, Dakota cover his ears and Cavendish presses a button on his watch, the watch makes a sound wave that is able to incapacítate the whole group, they try to cover their ears from the deafening sound wave but they are unable to do so.

The british man then pulls from one of his suit pockets a metal ball of the size of a baseball, plastered with holes on it. In order to actívate it he presses a button on top of it and a loud sound can be heard coming from it.

Swiftly, Cavendish grabs his partner from his hand and runs alongside him towards the entrance, the cave is starting to look more like a secret laboratory and Dakota looks back to see what happened with the troops.

The sight horrifies him, he sees the men get slaughtered by Cavendish’s metal ball that is deploying bombs at anything that moves while it runs around. nothing is stopping it from it’s rampage.

“Um… Cavendish… Did you just…”

Dakota looks appalled and shook, he just witnessed Cavendish basically kill a group of men for the sake of the world.

Cavendish on the other hand encounters that the door to proceed is tight on security with a hand print lock, luckily enough, he has a device that can take care of that.

He pulls out a transparent glove and puts it on his hand, and the glove is capable of detecting the hand prints needed for the door to open with a scan, afterwards it adjusts them accordingly in Cavendish’s hand. Balthazar then rests his hand on the hand print device, and it allows them to get through.

Cavendish does not say a single word as he doesn’t want to alert the guards inside the room they just entered, it seems to be a very high scale and budget secret laboratory, with tons of substances and devices used to experiment and create new bio weapons and such.

Dakota however is not very pleased with being ignored.

“Cavendish!” He whispers with a high tone, still being undercover but also somewhat yelling at Cavendish.

“What Dakota? What do you want now?” He receives his partner with his condescending glare, he does not have time to attend to Dakota’s needs, this time the american is not gonna have it though.

“Don’t you dare give me that look right now Cavendish, we just killed a bunch of guys back there! And you didn’t even bat an eye!”

Cavendish’s vision widens, as he has realized now what he just did, he was so focused on the mission that he didn’t think of that consequence, he really just killed people in order to progress with his mission.

“I… I am sorry Dakota I… I just did it on reflex… Wanting to make sure they wouldn’t… Follow us and mess up our mission… I want to do a good job… But I just took the life of some people for my own gain…”

Dakota’s frustration with time becomes less pronounced, as he sees Cavendish feeling extreme guilt and regret, maybe he could of figured out a way to get them out of the picture while not killing them.

“Well… Now that I think about it… Everybody is here is a bad person right? They want to dominate the world or somethin, I dunno, but if we end up getting the world rid of those kind of people, it ain’t that bad right?” Vinnie tries to cheer up his colleague with some reassuring words, and it does help, but it doesn’t really remove that thought out of Cavendish’s head.

“Yes but… They could of been reformed… They could of changed… But I didn’t give them the chance to do so…”

“Cavendish…” Dakota rests his hand on Cavendish’s shoulder, giving him an understanding stare, he knows this is a deep burden for him, and this is something he wants to do, Dakota does not agree with killing people, but he understands if that is what it takes, he will go through with it alongside his partner, all of this from a single glare.

Cavendish smiles faintly and feels the trust that Dakota is putting on him, so he switches views from his co-worker to the laboratory.

Many scientists are making experiments with a green substance that seems very, very important to them, they are even using gloves and claws to grab the container that is keeping the liquid inside.

“Hey… What even is that green thing? They actually need to use gloves and all of that gear to even carry it”

“I don’t quite know what it is Dakota, but it seems to be rather important to them, perhaps that is what they are gonna use to execute their master plan”

While the both of them contemplate the situation, a very loud alarm starts to sound inside the facility.

“ATTENTION, THERE IS AN INFILTRATION OF A SMALL, ROUND METAL DEVICE THAT DEPLOYS BOMBS. ERRADICATE INMEDIATELY AND SEEK SHELTER”

The alarm alongside the speaker shouting out these words and a red alert light covering the whole building and flickering, make everybody run desperately for escape or shelter, thanks to Cavendish’s bomb the entire place is starting to be on a scramble.

The time agents take this opportunity to step away from their hiding spot and try to do some research on what the plan of this facility truly is.

Cavendish looks for papers while Dakota keeps watch of anybody entering the room. He checks the cameras to see any signals of somebody coming to the laboratory, but it seems that the personel is way too focused on the bomb robot that Cavendish deployed.

“Aha!” Exclaims Balthazar. He has found a secret report that details on the plans ment for this secret lair.

“I have found it Dakota! The master plan for this group to follow, I will read it out loud to you, since you are keeping watch”

“All right”

Cavendish is about to start reading the document but unfortunately, he hears the cocking of a gun right behind him, the person holding the gun was fully aware of Dakota’s blind spot and used it to gain up to the brit.

“So… You two are the clowns who are foiling my plan huh?”

The person appears to be a man, wearing a white American suit, a deep blue vest, white shirt, pink ascot, white pants with his hair slicked back and young looking, most likely on his mid 20’s.

He is pointing the gun at Cavendish’s back and the man stands up right and puts his hands up in the air, as he knows he doesn’t have another gadget that he can reach to distract or fight his attacker.

Dakota just sees the situation feeling helpless and unable to do anything, one wrong move and Cavendish could be killed.

“What are you trying to accomplish? Don’t you understand what i’m about to do here?”

“No, not really, Cavendish didn’t get to tell me what your plan even is”

The villanous man smirks and gives out a chuckle, feeling very confident and secure on his situation, even though Cavendish and Dakota have done a mess to his facility, it seems this doesn’t phase him at all.

“You saw that green liquid my men were transporting and how much is there of it?”

The pair nod at the man’s question and he keeps telling his plan.

“That liquid is very, very adaptable to whatever I need, I can use it as a toxin, as an explosive, as corrosive material, as a solid wall, even more stable than steel itself, and most importantly…”

The man just shows his true insanity and intentions with a very creepy and wide smile with his teeth as he explains the most important piece of knowledge he has to offer.

“CONTROL THE ENTIRETY OF THE HUMAN MIND AND MAKE THEM BEND AT MY WILL! EVEN WITH THE MOST MINUSCULE DROP OF IT!”

“WHAT!?” Both Cavendish and Dakota spout out as they are shocked to hear the revelation of the man. He wants to mind control the entire world to do his will.

“You… You are a horrible man! Why would you even want to have that kind of power! You already seem to have a lot of money and other things, why even more!?” Cavendish inquires on the white suit wearing man, as he doesn’t understand why somebody would want so much control.

“it has become harder and harder to fool people, into making them do stupid mistakes with their money or their life choices, so in order to make it easier for me and my colleagues, it would be better if we could just control the entirety of humanity, or at least a very large portion of it. Money does move the world you know? And it really does make me happy that it does, maybe the two of you could make some fine experiments”

The time agents are now scared of what could happen to them if they don’t figure out a way to get out of this pickle.

Dakota fortunately enough noticed something: The guy pointing the gun at Cavendish is very close to him, and can easily hit him on his knees to make him drop the gun, so Dakota also in order to distract the man lifts his hands into the air.

“All riiiight, there we go, see? Was that so hard my friend?” The man exclaims with a grin on his face, he is sure this is gonna be the end of this whole ordeal. He is completely wrong, and he finds out soon enough when Vinnie sweeps him with a kick and he falls to the ground, launching the pistol into the air as it fell off from his grasp.

“AAAHH!”

“CAVENDISH LET’s BOOK IT!” Dakota yelps out to his partner.

“R-right!” He puts the secret report on a pocket inside his jacket and runs alongside Dakota, looking for an exit, as they run along they are able to see in the cameras how Cavendish’s robot just keeps destroying the whole place with the explosives, and how it is still hurting people that is attempting to stop it.

“We need to get out of here, that metal ball is not gonna stop until it completely destroys the place, or if it is destroyed itself!” The brit tells Dakota with a hurried tone.

The American is able to spot some motorcycles that were ment for the personel of the location, they hop on in separate ones and start them up.

They are travelling at highway speed, making sure they don’t run into any pieces of rock or metal.

To their bad luck however, they hear another motorcycle behind them.

“GUESS WHO’S HEREEEEE!”

It’s the white suit man, chasing after them with his own motorcycle and carrying an AK-47.

“HOLY!” Dakota says with his face turning slighty pale, he is actually scared of seeing that man with that type of equipment.

“Dakota, weave! Do not let him hit you!” Cavendish spouts as they start weaving and changing directions constantly, as well as their paths that they take in order to avoid the crazy villain.

“You aren’t gonna get away!” He starts shooting towards Cavendish and Dakota who are able to just barely avoid the bullets, it appears that the man is not very experienced with guns in general.

“Damn it! If I had one of my soldiers with me this would of been a done deal!” He complaints as he keeps trying to take down the time agents.

The pair are able to spot a rock that looks like a ramp, it seems that the path also has a very huge gap so they need to make a very risky jump. They look at each other to make sure they are on the same boat.

The British and the American nod at themselves and increase the speed of their motorcycles getting ready to jump the huge gap.

The jump is a success and they are able to make it through the huge gap, the villain attemps to do the same, but the weight of the weapon he is carrying is just enough to drag his speed and he is unable to make it, just barely however.

“NO! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

The poor man falls into his doom, with an explosión being heard from the bottom alongside an accompaning red light.

Cavendish and Dakota see what has happened to the man by looking back, afterwards they look at each other feeling happy and succesfull.

“Yeah! We did it!” Dakota says joyous, his partner feels the same and offers a high five.

Dakota takes it gladly while they still ride and the pair get all giddy about their accomplishment, this doesn’t last long as they just noticed a rock that is tall enough to catch their motorcycles but not hurt them physically.

“AAAAAAHHHHHH!” Both of them hug each other as they prepare for the impact, a crash happens with Cavendish and Dakota getting launched into the air and their motorcycles exploding in the process.

They keep flying into the air screaming, until Dakota notices that they are going straight into a hole but there is a ledge very close to it as well, so he points at Cavendish with his finger about the ledge.

“Grab iiiiiiiiitt!”

Him and Cavendish catch themselves from falling into the dark abyss by grabbing into the ledge of the cliff.

They look down below and it seems to them that the fall is pretty massive and are barely clanging on to the rocks.

“Oh… Oh boy… That… That looks pretty deep” Dakota says while he is sweating from his forehead, he is feeling extremely nervous and scared, he has never really faced this type of situation before, of being hanging on for dear life on a cliff.

The explosions from the device that Cavendish unleashed keep making a huge mess of the place, making it shake and rumble, as the structural strength of the cave starts to give in, the pair are shaken from the cliff, still barely hanging on using all of their energy to do so.

The Brit is also able to see that the rocks they are clinging onto are also starting to get weaker and less stable.

The combined weight of both is not gonna be able to sustain them for much longer.

So, Cavendish understands what needs to be done… He turns his head towards Dakota and speaks to him.

“Um… Dakota?”

Dakota looks at Cavendish calling for his name.

“Yeah?”

Balthazar’s expression switches from fear to some type of relief, but also extreme sadness, it looks like he is almost about to cry in front of Dakota.

“…Please… Protect the future… Do what I wanted to do for my entire life, protect others and become their hero” Immediately, Cavendish lets go of the ledge, dropping himself into the bottom of the abyss.

“CAVENDISH!!!!!!!!!!!!” Dakota screams with all of his breath, extending his hand in an attempt to save his partner, it is way too late however.

The Brit himself wants to scream his lungs out as he is falling, but restrains himself from doing so, as he wants his friend to remember those last words he said, instead of a horrifying scream from his partner falling into his death.

SHUNK!

Dakota hears that sound echo through the whole room he was at, he wants to know what that sound was so using his legs and arms he gets up from the ledge, standing in a safe spot of the cliff.

He uses his flashlight to try and look into the abyss Cavendish just fell on.

It is a horrible and traumatizing view.

It is Cavendish who has fallen into a spike made out of rocks, they were a bunch of them all around that area as well, so no matter where he fell, that same result would of happened. The poor man has the spike going through the entirety of his back and coming out from his belly and chest, with blood coming out of his body, blood that apparently he spit out in a huge gash and his eyes fully opened, but lifeless.

“C-Ca…Cavendish…” Dakota cannot handle the sight of his friend being dead in such a horrible way.

He kneels down and grabs his head, feeling like the world is closing in, that there isn’t any room to breathe, that there isn’t any light.

Cavendish might not be considered the best friend ever, but to Dakota after spending 10 years working with him and hanging out with him, how Cavendish treated him with respect, care and understanding, that even though Dakota knew how much he annoyed him, Cavendish would still stick around with him no matter what, and even helped him out a few times… To Dakota, this was the heaviest blow he had ever received in his entire life.

This… This didn’t need to happen did it? Cavendish didn’t deserve that did he? It was the only thing that was going through Dakota’s mind.

Until another alarm started to sound.

“ALERT, ALERT, THE ENTIRE FACILITY IS GONNA CRUMBLE IN 30 SECONDS, EVACUATE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE”

Dakota understanding that if he stayed there, Cavendish’s sacrifice would of been in vane, he gets out of the cave as fast as he can, he fortunately makes it out and sees some of the structure fall down.

Luckily, the exit where he just came from is still intact, and any rescue group would still be able to find Cavendish’s corpse.

That is somewhat good news for Balthazar’s family, but not for Dakota.

“Why… Why did he have to… I… I could do that myself… I should of done that myself… I am always annoying… I always bother everybody… And he was the only one that understood me…” Vinnie voices through his wavering tone, he is frustrated, angry, but most importantly, saddened, he saw his friend sacrifice himself to save his life, and he couldn’t do anything to stop it.

“I could've…” He eventually does start to sob, trying to contain himself as he doesn’t want anyone to know what has happened to him, he is supposed to be happy all the time, he is supposed to take everything easy, he isn’t the type of guy to cry, right?

He just remembers what his partner told him before his demise, trying to come to terms with the situation.

“…Please… Protect the future… Do what I wanted to do for my entire life, protect others and become their hero…” Dakota repeats to himself, reflexing on those words.

An idea comes into his mind from the reflection.

“Wait… The future… I am a time traveler… So, maybe I can go back and save him! Or prevent all of this from happening!” He spouts with the reminder that he is a time traveler with a time machine.

“But… That is a serious thing… I could go to time jail for doing that… I shouldn’t be changing the timeline to fit my own needs… And Cavendish wanted to give up his life so I could live mine…”

The man gets his spirits down by also remembering of the harsh punishments he could receive if somebody were to find out he used time travel to save his partner, he is really aware of this consequence.

“But… This is for Cavendish! He is my friend and he didn’t deserve to die! I don’t care how many rules I end up breaking as long as I can get him back! I am gonna do it for him! I’ll just figure out what to do next as I go!” He says with determination, fully knowing what he is about to do, just to save his friend from a horrible death.

He goes where Cavendish left the time machine which is a primitive looking 1920’s model of a car and activates the time console, going back a few minutes to try and save Cavendish before they even enter the place.

By taking a different path than before, he reaches up to his past self and Cavendish while they walk in the forest, Dakota takes the opportunity to replace his past self as Cavendish was checking intensely his tracking device, he yanks his past self, covering his mouth into a dark part of the forest.

“!?” His past self does not even get time to react, as the present Dakota knocks him out with a karate strike on his neck, he leaves him in a safe spot close to a log and covers him with a bush.

Switfly, he goes back to Cavendish who finishes looking at his device.

“The path forward is that way Dakota, the door should be right in front of us”

Dakota expresses concern while looking at Cavendish, wanting to sell that he is feeling uncomfortable.

“Em… Cav… I know you wanna do this and all but… Do ya think we could leave it to another agent...?” He says blushing in embarrassment, rubbing the back of his neck nervously.

“Pardon me?” Cavendish asks confused.

“I-it’s… It’s just… Something about this whole mission… I have a very bad feeling about it Cavendish, I’m sorry… I just… Don’t wanna go”

Cavendish sighs in annoyance, but decides to give in to Dakota’s wish.

“All right then, I will let another agent handle it, if you don’t want to do it, we don’t do it. Your mental health IS important after all” Cavendish responds with a reassuring and faint smile.

Vinnie smiles and feels happy that Cavendish is not going there anymore, we won’t die from that experience, he won’t have to sacrifice himself, they are still gonna be able to be friends.

For now at least, and even more fortunate, as Cavendish tells Mr.Block that they cannot progress with the mission, another pair of agents were free to handle it.

Afterwards the two agents goa head and take a break from all of the walking they had to do.

Dakota knows that if he kept going forward and not save Cavendish, he and his partner would of earned extreme amounts of respect and glory for stopping a world changing event that he willingly gave up just to be with Cavendish. He does not care about that.

He only cares about being with Cavendish one more time, he is his friend and nothing is gonna change that on his mind.

When the both of them say goodbye to go home, Dakota goes into the forest to find himself, he is fortunately able to do so.

It was a very big risk to leave his past self on the forest for so much time, but he sighs in relief seeing himself still lying on the ground and hidden in the bush.

“Hey, wake up me” He delivers some wake up slaps into his past self, and he wakes up.

“Uugggh… My head…” He holds his head as he is still feeling very dizzy from the hit he received.

“Wow…” Past Dakota sees his future self in awe, as he didn’t expect for this kind of thing to happen.

“Hey… Uh… Sorry about that, I had to do something in order to save Cavendish” He grabs his neck feeling guilty, even though he only hurt himself, he still considers it as hurting somebody, and he does NOT like doing that at all.

“S-save Cavendish? What are ya talking about? And how are you here? Wouldn’t this create a paradox or somethin?” Past Dakota asks confused, the poor man does not understand anything about the situation.

“Y-yeah… You see… He… Um… He…” It is very hard for present Dakota to communicate the absolutely horrible news that he has to his past self, and he doesn’t even know if he’s gonna take him seriously.

“Come on! Spit it out already, you are making me feel like I wanna throw up from the suspense!

“Cavendish died” Something straight into the point, hopefully that works to voice out how bad things are.

“WHAT!? WHAT DO YOU MEAN HE DIED!?” The past Dakota is exalhted, he cannot believe what he just heard and is terrified of the idea of Cavendish dying at all.

“Y-yeah… He… He sacrificied himself to save my own life… It’s a long story but… I… I just had to fix it…” The American responds to himself while grabbing his arm, just not being able to feel happy with himself after letting Cavendish do that for him.

“I… I can’t believe you… How did you let that happen!?” The past Dakota expresses his anger towards his future self, he is not gonna let this go easily.

“Look, it was an accident and the ledge wasn’t gonna hold us for much longer! One of us had to go! And I was thinking of doing it but… Cav beat me to the punch… I’m… I’m back here because I need to fix this… He didn’t… He didn’t deserve to go out like that…” Present Dakota cannot really handle himself well either but in a different way, Cavendish’s death has affected him deeply and it shows.

Past Dakota notices how badly this has hurt him, and decides to help him on his mission.

“Okay… Okay… I can give up my place but… Where am I gonna go?”

Both of them stare at each other, not really figuring out what to do next, or where the past Dakota should go.

“Hmm… Well… What place did you want to go as a kid?” Present Dakota asks, maybe he can put him in the far away past and make him spend his life there, that way Cavendish or anybody else will ever find out about all of this.

“You know, I kinda wished to have lived in the 70’s, it has been a big influence for both of us, in fact all of those cop shows they had back in those days kinda inspired us to even consider being time travelers, although it was more like a neat idea that could give some good pay. But… I guess it changed our entire life huh?” As past Dakota was thinking of the 70’s and reflecting on why he even decided to become a time travel, the pair realize how much this jo has really changed them.

“Yeah… Just because of this job we got to know Cavendish, and I’m breaking the rules just to be with him again… It is insane hehe” Present Dakota states as he blushes slighty, he’s going through all of this trouble to save his partner from his death, just because he values him that much.

“Okay, I think it’s time we go, I really, really hope I don’t have to do this ever again. I just want you to take care in the past, as I am NOT gonna go back in there, got it?”

“Yeah, I getcha, if this is for Cavendish, I will gladly stay in the past” The two of them head out into the 1970’s, past Dakota gets off the time machine car, and present Dakota waves goodbye, transporting himself into 2025, meeting up with Cavendish and returning to the future alongside him.

This experience has really left Dakota with a mark on his heart, just… Having to carry the burden of his friend dying as a sacrifice, it didn’t feel right to him, and he wanted to fix it, in his heart, he _needed_ to fix it and went through all of that trouble just to do so. All of this for his friend, and he was okay with it.

_____________________________________________________________________________

“There we go, nice and clean, I think after so many times that I needed to fix my writting I got it right”

Finally, after quite a few hours I was able to finish writting this for Cav! I just… Wanted to let all of this go out of my body, it is quite taxing to have to handle seeing my best friend die and die over again, but I haven’t really told him of how he has died. The other Dakotas didn’t even have time to talk with him, but if they cannot do so, I can, the original Dakota.

I just hope he takes all of this… As nicely as he can, I know he might get angry, or he might want to cry but… I need to make him know about his first major death, the first time I had to go back in time to save him.

Murphy was pretty kind in giving us this laptop though, he actually used up some of his money, some of Zack’s, some of Melissa’s, even Amanda ended up giving a bit to help pay for the laptop, with this little baby Cav has been able to do his reports so much faster, and we have been able to watch some videos too without having to look into a small phone screen.

Cav should be here any minute now, he said he wanted to buy some food to last us a few days, since he really didn’t feel like cooking anything today and wanted to experiment some new things from the mall.

I’m just gonna leave the computer on his desk and make things go naturally… But at least I got my headphones, so I won’t have to listen to Cav unless it is absolutely necessary, I just want him to… Process all of that stuff that I wrote as best as I can make it happen.

_____________________________________________________________________________

All righty… So, the laptop is on Cav’s desk, just a matter of waiting for him to come back and then see how he reacts to it.

Headphones on, music is ready for me to play it at any moment, just gonna wait for those key sounds.

_Cling, cling, cling._

There they are, he finally made it here.

Cavendish opens the door as sees me there, chilling with my headphones and he starts talking to me.

“Hello Dakota, sorry I took so long, I just wanted to make sure I had a lot of food ready for us to just heat up and eat whenever we like, I really don’t feel like cooking anything, I did tell you before but I didn’t quite know if you caught on or not”

I noticed that Cav was definetely heavy lifting those bags full of cans and instant soups, it does strike me a bit oddly that Cav would be the lazy guy this couple of days, maybe he did something very tough and he wants to take a break or somethin’, who knows, but i’m not gonna leave him hangin’ for an answer.

“Yeah, I did catch ya the first time you said it Cav, I was getting a bit worried that you took so long, but hey, you’re here safe and sound and that’s all that matters to me, even if you didn’t bring anything for us to eat, I wouldn’t have cared”

I tried to make it sound recomforting, as I didn’t want Cav to feel too bad about spending so much time getting food, I really don’t want him to feel bad about anything before he reads what I typed for him.

“Oh… Well, thank you Dakota, I am also glad I was able to come back here safe and sound, and I go apologize for making you anxious about my return, I do however want to take a rest, I have been walking all around the place, going from aisle to aisle, looking for various instant soups, cans and such”

After he tells me that, he leaves the bags on the floor, very close to his deskstop and notices that I left the laptop on his desk.

“Hmm? Dakota, why did you leave the laptop here? I thought you were gonna use it for the entire day”

Well, I thought it was gonna take me the whole day, but it was way easier than I thought it was gonna be after so many retries, obviously deleting the files whenever I knew Cavendish wanted to use the computer for something, so I am just gonna simply explain that to him.

“Nah, I actually got bored of watching videos and started listening to my music, besides, I kinda figured you would be tired from buying all of that stuff from the mall so I had it all ready for you to use it if you wanted, if i’m not using it why would I want to hug it all for myself? It is ment to be for both of us, not just me”

All of that is mostly true, I do want Cav to relax but… This is definetely not gonna help out for that case, this is the way I want to deal with it, and maybe he is gonna understand it that may, although… He can be very dense so he might not understand… Well, what is done is done, at least he smiled at me when I said I wanted him to relax.

So he went ahead and sat down on his chair, putting his hands together while his elbows were giving support to his arms as they were placed in the desktop, it is a focused and sorta serious kind of want to sit down and relax if you ask me, but that’s Cav for ya.

_____________________________________________________________________________

He has been reading the entire thing for 10 minutes, and he hasn’t gotten into the truly bad stuff just yet, he has been pretty relaxed but focused on reading what I typed in, I am sure he is taking this seriously and I can see it on his eyes, and the way he clicks on the mouse to scroll down and be able to read more tells me the same. I have been listening to my music while reading a magazine, or at least pretending to, as I am keeping an eye on Cav at all times, watching his reactions to the words that display on the screen.

There’s the first major reaction though… He put his hand over his mouth, pretty surprised and shocked, I think he got to the part where he killed those soldier guys. It seems he is more shook than anything, he really just saw himself kill people in order to complete his mission, after he had his hand cover his mouth, he positions it on his chin instead as he keeps reading.

A few more minutes pass, and Cav is closer to the screen, as if he is wanting to read as best as possible, he is extremely into the text. His clicks become louder and louder as he goes through more and more text.

I am starting to get a bit concerned because it seems he is reaching the part where he dies, and I really don’t know how he is gonna take it.

I keep looking at him for 5 more minutes, trying to gauge how much this is affecting him while also looking into my magazine from time to time.

And then I noticed… He wasn’t clicking anymore, he was staring at the screen with now both of his hands covering his mouth. He got to _that_ part.

His eyes are wide open, he seems to be shaking a little bit and is overall appaled. I knew he wasn’t gonna take that… Image too kindly but I didn’t think it was gonna affect him that bad.

He spent 3 minutes regaining his composure, after he finally calms down, he takes a deep breath and continues on. I think that was the hardest part for him to watch, and he was able to get throught it, which I am glad about, so I think i’m gonna spend the rest of this reading this magazine, which I didn’t even notice was about fashion.

Not any fashion though, but very high class fashion, this is probably one of Cavendish’s magazines, since he loves to look at those expensive and fancy suits, vests, neck ties, lady shoes, jewelry, all of that stuff. He really does love those things doesn’t he? I kinda wish I was a bit more like him on that sense, but those clothes would be so… Uncomfortable for me, I was already getting tired of my leather jacket since it was so bulky, I cannot even imagine how much of a hassle a fancy suit would be for me!

I let some more time pass by, and on a glance, I see Cav get up from his seat and come towards me, he had a very serious expression on his face and was standing right next to me, so in order to speak properly with him I get up from my seat and look straight at him.

He opens his mouth to talk and I listen carefully.

“Dakota… Did you write all of that…?”

“Yeah, I did”

Cavendish’s expression is still the same somewhat, but he seems to show some softness on his face, I dunno how to describe but… He didn’t seem as upset as I thought he would be.

“Well… Was everything that you wrote in there true? I do not doubt your words but… It appears to have been quite a long time ago and you might not of been able to remember all of the details clearly”

I see, Cav wants to make sure I ain’t lying in order to protect him, and I can understand that, but I am gonna be as honest as I can be.

“Believe me Cav, that being the first time you… You know, died, I wouldn’t be able to forget it even if I tried, the way I described things is the exact way they happened, for better or for worse. I’m… Sorry I had you go and read all of that stuff but… I couldn’t let it be inside me anymore, I needed to let it out of my system, and I also never told you about the first time you died, and I also have horrible writting on paper, so what better way to describe it and show it than something that everybody can understand?”

Cavendish gave me a soft smile, like he was happy about something, and I really don’t get why he is doing that… He should be upset shouldn’t he?

“That is… Very commendable and considerate of you Dakota, the way you showed me all of this was very subtle and thoughtful… If you straight up told me about it I might not of taken it very kindkly, and being completely blunt… Your writting was actually rather impressive, quite easy to follow and straight into the point. What I wanted to address however… And the main reason you even wrote this, I understand all of that text was explaining the first time I ever died, how you felt and such… And… Well… I am not too upset about it”

WHAT!? HOW COULD HE SAY THAT!? HE JUST READ HIS FIRST HORRIBLE DEATH AND HE IS NOT TOO UPSET ABOUT IT!? I absolutely broke him for SURE! Oh god… This is bad, this is really bad… I shouldn’t even have done this in the first place! Stupid Dakota!

“C-cav! How can you say that!? I explained in very explicit detail how you died, how horrible it felt to see you like that and how I felt you didn’t deserve any of that at all!”

Cavendish chuckles at himself and smiles wryly.

“Let me explain myself first Dakota, I am obviously shaken by the revelation, and I am somewhat… Uncomfortable knowing how I died… But at the same time… I am rather happy with the result, yes, I would of been gone from your life forever with my sacrifice. If that was the case however, I couldn’t have thought of a… Better way to go if you will, I gave up my life in order to save someone I truly valued important to do so, knowing that if I did so, I wouldn’t come back from it, it is not an easy decission to make Dakota. You know how much I have wanted to help others, to be their hero, to have the respect of somebody, but… With this situation, I just realized… I already did all of that… With you”

 _H-he…_ _He is saying that… He is my hero…?_

“I was able to become a hero in that mission that no longer exists by helping to save the world, I saved your own life and you could of gotten massive recognition, and maybe they would of made a memorial on my image, something to remember me by, it would of been a good conclusion to my life if you ask me, although… You made an even bigger sacrifice than what I was able to do for you, you gave up on that life, of receiving recognition, fame, glory, for people to maybe like you as who you were, just to be… With me, your friend. I truly value all of that Dakota, in my mind, you have been my hero because of those times you have saved me by going back in time… But now I feel that I was able to repay you some of what you have done for me. It really feels amazing to have somebody that cares for you that deeply, but sometimes you feel completely useless by not really paying all of those actions back, with this revelation, I know the reason you even started doing all of that for me in the first place. To prevent my own sacrifice, and quite honestly… I am not upset about it”

Cav’s smile became different… He has smiled at me before but… This time he looks proud, he feels happy… He feels satisfied with himself, truly satisfied about something he did, and he understands that he earned it… I cannot even grasp my own emotions right now… I am like in a vortex… A vacuum… I don’t know how to react…

“if it wasn’t for you Dakota… I wouldn’t be here at all, enjoying my life alongside you, getting to know Milo and his own friends, this might not be the best life I could be living in terms of my own success, but I do not care as long as I have you on my side”

He then supports his hand on my right shoulder, showing me respect and care.

“After all of that mess with Hildegard… I realized that I don’t really need anyone else anymore, even if I never get married or have children, I still have other people to take care of, that care for me, and that have showed me that I am way more worthy of living than I first thought when joining BoTT. You are my hero and my best friend Dakota, and I wouldn’t really have it any other way”

The moment he finishes that sentence… I can feel it… A very tender and heart felt hug… That’s the kind of hug only Cavendish can give me… And I just wanna release my own feelin’s too, so I give in and hug him as well.

“You know Cav… You might not really think so, but if it wasn’t for you I would probably be in the gutter too because of my bad habits, maybe as a hobo, or just straight up an obese guy not doing much of his life, even if you didn’t find out about this… You are _my_ hero too”

I never felt so happy with letting a truth out… I lifted such a heavy burden from my shoulders… I felt even more relaxed than ever… My friend is here with me, and he would never change his life to have it any other way, and I shared that same feeling… I really couldn’t ask for anything else, and for Cavendish…

It was the first time he ever was proud of something he did. The first time I sensed it on his heart.

The first time, both of us were happy about one of his deaths.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this is my take for Cavendish's first death ever, and I really hope all of you enjoyed it, I had this idea in the back burner for quite a bit but I am glad it has been released into the world!
> 
> The artist who made the art for this fic is Charmmy, and I would absolutely love all of you if you could check out her twitter! She definitely deserves the praise :P https://twitter.com/CharmmyColour


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